ATLANTA—Shares of cold-storage REIT Americold Realty Trust began trading Friday on the New York Stock Exchange under the COLD ticker after the company priced its initial public offering at $16 per share, the high end of the IPO's price range. The IPO was upsized to 45.3 million common shares from the 24 million originally announced on Jan. 9.

A portfolio company of Ron Burkle's Yucaipa Cos., COLD initially planned an IPO in 2010 but the offering was scrapped, reportedly due to market conditions. Published reports say the Blackstone Group sought to buy COLD last fall but was turned down when Burkle judged the $3-billion bid to be too low. The current IPO could value COLD at up to $4 billion, Seeking Alpha reported last month.

In addition to the 45.3 million shares trading in the IPO, COLD and the selling shareholders have granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 6.975 million shares at the IPO price. BofA Merrill Lynch, J.P. Morgan and RBC Capital Markets are acting as the joint book-running managers for the offering. Rabo Securities, Baird, Citizens Capital Markets, Raymond James, SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, BB&T Capital Markets and BTIG are acting as co-managers